Many play balls have been developed for use in various sports, games, and other recreational activities. In many of these activities, the play balls are relatively soft, such as being formed from a foamed material, and the balls are intended to be caught by a child or other participant. These conventional balls provide a safe way to participate in these activities because the foamed material is soft and absorbs the energy of impact. Similarly, the compressibility and resiliency of the foamed material enables the ball to strike participants or other objects without injury. Because a foam ball does not rely upon an inflated bladder to provide its shape and/or properties, foam balls tend to be more durable than bladder-based balls. For example, a foam ball may be punctured or cut and will generally retain its original construction and properties.
Current foam balls are generally made by one of two methods. One is to start with a quantity, or bun, of foam material, usually polyurethane foam, and grind it into the desired shape. For example, this bun may be ground to a sphere, a football shape, etc. The exterior surface of this ball is often simply the raw foam material. In other words, the surface and interior of the ball have the same construction. In a variant of this conventional process, a surface coat is sprayed or otherwise coated onto the shaped foam.
The second conventional method is to mold the ball using a two-part polyurethane system. The two parts of the polyurethane system are mixed and then dispensed into a mold. The mixed materials are secured within the mold and then cured with heat. The foam expands to fill the cavity and then hardens into the final product. In this process, the surface finish of the ball is formed in one of two ways. First, a “self-skinning” foam is used in which the foam itself forms a skin on the surface of the ball. The second is to spray a “barrier coat” on the surface of the mold prior to dispensing the foam. This sprayed-on surface then becomes the surface of the ball. Both of these methods provide a surface that is cosmetically pleasing but has relatively low friction and therefore makes the ball somewhat slick and difficult to grasp, such as when throwing or catching the ball.
While the construction of these foamed play balls makes them suitable for use by children and/or in settings where hard or full-sized sporting articles are not appropriate, the resilient nature of these balls tends to make them harder to catch and to accurately throw due to the spongy, resilient construction of the ball and the lack of an effective grip surface on the exterior of the ball.